Rasputin's Bastards (59 page)

Wali Beg stepped into the chamber. He too had removed his cowl, to reveal a half-bald head and eyes that on another occasion would have been laughing. Now they were dead as Ming’s.

Ming turned to him. Young Alexei sat perfectly still, his eyelids fluttering. Wali Beg stepped into the light. He extended a hand to touch Ming’s shoulder. Ming did not flinch away. Wali Beg moved his fingers down her collarbone and took hold of a breast in the calloused palm of his hand. Ming pressed herself into it. Young Alexei’s eyes opened to behold the scene.

Alexei sat stunned. He looked to himself — the couple — awkwardly up into the shaft of light through the cave — and finally, back at Vladimir.

“I’m dream-walking them. Aren’t I?” Alexei paced off to the far end of the cave and came back again, hands excitedly grasping one another behind his back. “That is it! Of course! All the times that Kolyokov and the rest told me that I had no talents — that is the lie of my life!” Alexei thought back to the tiny memories he had of his mother and what she used to say:
You are a little Koldun — a little lodge wizard
. He looked back at the strange couple, clasped in a passionless embrace. “I am dream-walking them! I have been a dream-walker all along! A wicked dream-walker like Fyodor Kolyokov!”

“What a clever man you are,” said Vladimir drolly. “Good thinking. But no. Completely wrong.”

Alexei’s face fell. “No?”

Vladimir shook his head. “You talk too much, Kilodovich. Too much talking is dangerous. You should listen more.”

Alexei opened his mouth. Vladimir made a hushing motion with his little hands. Alexei closed his mouth again and frowned — and listened.

Alexei blinked in astonishment. There were voices. Other voices. Russian voices — which he vaguely recognized.

Stop playing. This is serious business.

What is serious business? This? It is done?

Not done.

Not done?

All.

All but —

All but one.

Soon.

Why?

Remember Rodionov. GeneralRodionovsaidhewouldreturninforceandfinishthisobsceneexperimentwit

hgunsandtechnology“YouarefinishedKolyokovwehaveawartofight”“thenletmefightt hewarwithyou”“onelastchanceonelastchance”

Your problem.

Our problem.

Problem?

Letrodionovdohisworstweshallbebeyondhisreachinthestationinthestationwher-etheseasingsandthedevilcannotreachus

Problem if he discovers our boy here.

Point.

Point.

Agreed.

Pay attention.

Over

By

Shipment —

Who?

Thedeafonetheonethatwillnotmaketheonewiththecontactsinpakistantheonewho-broughtthegirlwelovethegirlthegirltheonewhobroughthimtheonewiththesolidskull-solidskullsolidskull

Amar Shadak.

“What is that?” whispered Alexei. “It is incomprehensible.”

Vladimir’s smile was all gums. “Discourse,” he said. “That which you are hear-ing is what we call Discourse. When we speak to one another without words. It is like the conversation we are having now. But broader.”

“Broader?” Alexei frowned. “It sounds insane. Who is it that is speaking?”

“Many,” said Vladimir. “You really have no inkling about Discourse, do you?”

“I’ve heard the word. Many who? Is Fyodor Kolyokov among them?”

“Oh yes.” As they spoke, Ming and Wali Beg separated and turned on a foot to face away from one another — like dancers in a music box. Young Alexei stood with his hands dangling at his side, his head back and jaw slack.

“Am I — was I among them?”

Vladimir rubbed his face and his smile vanished.

“You are getting close,” he said, “to the nub of things.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” said Alexei.

“Listen,” whispered Vladimir.

The caves fell silent: only the faint whistling of wind through unseen fissures; the distant thunder, more sporadic now, of artillery fire. Ming and Wali Beg had sat down, backs to one another and cross-legged in the sand. Young Alexei’s eyes were open, and seemed alert, but he sat still, leaning laconically against a crate in the top tine of the
E
. The sky was a disc of gold and azure at the top of the chimney. It mingled with the dark blue of the top of the carriage to make purple. Nothing moved — it was as if nothing lived. Idly, Alexei rocked the carriage.

“What is to happen next?” asked Alexei.

The carriage creaked.

“Vladimir?”

Alexei stepped around the carriage. His breath caught in his throat.

“Vladimir!” The seat was empty. Vladimir was gone.

Alexei bunched his fists. And looked around the cave. He swore. The little bastard had abandoned him! Left him at the cusp of understanding. In a great, silent cave, where even the whistling of the wind was muted.

“Talk to me!” He hollered it to the sky. To the others. The wind whistled.

And after a moment, he could hear:

RodionovRodionov

Discourse.

The Discourse was still going strong — but the more Alexei listened, the more he could hear of it. And hearing more of it turned the entire thing into a cacoph-ony; it was like trying to tell the data from a telephone modem by listening to the connection screech:

Iyouitwillnotbeinthehellofyourmakingwewilltransformyouwalkwalkrunrunmo-verunredorangeyellowgreenblueindigovioletranoverrodionovcaseykandaharasey . . .

Was this Vladimir’s idea, Alexei wondered? To leave him alone with this in-decipherable rant, to let him figure out his history with this? He couldn’t believe that. He got up off the crate, and strode across the sand. He turned sideways and folded himself through the crack in the cave wall. And then, as he bent back and forward around the difficult rocks in the tunnel, Alexei lost track of the Dis-course. And the silence of the caves was broken by another sound — of angry whispering — just two voices; and just ahead.

Alexei continued forward — creeping, trying to be stealthy, in spite of the fact that he could move unseen and unheard. Finally, he made it to the end of the tunnel — and stepped out into the small antechamber. There was Shadak — and another man: one of the Mujahedeen. A thin-bodied, thin-bearded young man who Alexei vaguely remembered from the trip out.

“This is complete shit,” Shadak was saying. “You are not even attempting to hide the shipment. Why are there no guards on the hillside? This is a fucking set-up, isn’t it?”

The man was didn’t answer. He stared at Shadak and through him. Shadak ran a hand through his hair. He glared at the man.

“You fucker,” he said. “If this were a fucking drug run, I’d have shot you by now.

This is fucking intolerable.”

The man ran his own hand through his hair.

“Why don’t you fucking answer me?” he demanded. “Why don’t you fuck-ing — ”

Shadak stopped. He looked up. Directly at Alexei.

“You!” he said, eyes wide. Alexei’s own eyes went wide too. Then he felt a chill at his back — moving forward through him, like a storm through his flesh.

“What do you know of this?” said Shadak darkly.

“I — I don’t,” said Alexei.

“More than you,” came a voice from Alexei’s throat. “But not for long.” At the same time, he heard:

Redorangeyellowgreenbluepreparetheagentonetwothreereadysetgowemust-finishthisoneorallmaybelostthenRodionovRodionovRodionovonovovovovovfocus-focusonlyonechancetodothisrigh —

And then, Alexei found himself looking at the back of his own head. His own younger head. As the head receded, Alexei pieced together what had happened: his younger self had just passed through him — an intersection of his ghosts.

Of many ghosts. Locked in Discourse.

Alexei stepped back and watched his younger self step up to Shadak.

“What the fuck,” said Shadak darkly, “is going on?” He thrust his thumb back over his shoulder. “Nobody out there is doing a fucking thing! They’re standing still like fucking zombies and there’s work to be done! Those fucking Russian guns aren’t going away — they’re — they’re — they — ”

“On your knees,” said young Alexei.

“What?” Shadak blinked, and looked down at Alexei’s right hand. It was hold-ing an old Tokarev automatic pistol. Pointed at Shadak.

“On your knees,” he repeated.

Shadak’s face reddened. “What the fuck is this?”

OhhesgoodgoodskullthickasleadnothingthroughtheregoodgoodbadRodionovheresoonohey

heresoon

Alexei bent — stepped forward —

And stepped into himself.

He sat there a moment — crouched with his head sticking out of his younger chest, his ass poked out of the back of his younger knees. Shadak was staring up at him in a mix of outrage and terror. The gun was indisputable betrayal — Alexei didn’t need to read Shadak’s mind to know his mind. Shadak was saying something else — but intersecting as he was with himself, Alexei couldn’t make it out.

All he could hear, this close, was the chaotic scramble of Discourse.

FyodorconcentrateonmetaphoryoudmitritakeinthroughidtherestofyouhelpkilodovichvesseltoestablishthespacialstimulusstimulusstimRodionovRodionov

And then

— a fugue —

“Rodionov could kill us in a second. This is folly.”

Alexei blinked. The caves of Afghanistan were gone, replaced by a great dark-ness — a deep void where the voices of the Discourse slowed. Alexei floated in this void, rolling head over heels like a cosmonaut. In the darkness, he could make out shapes — huge shapes of men and women, ass-end toward him. They were big as sky-scrapers, as submarines. They spoke with voices as deep as a thunderclap and as af-fecting as an earthquake.

“Rodionov,” said another of the giants, floating beyond his reach, “will not kill us. He does not even know where we are.”

“Still — he has it in him. He’s got the will.”

“We should turn him.”

“Set your Alexei on him, Fyodor — and see.”

“Yes. Make him sleeper.”

Alexei swam toward the giants. He felt as though he were rising, and for a time imagined this place not a void at all, but water: a huge lake on which these bickering creatures floated. But that metaphor strained quickly; for as he looked up at them, he saw that they couldn’t be apprehended as floating in a particular order. They over-lapped one another as they floated.

“No need to worry about Rodionov,” repeated the first one. “We make these sleep-ers here — he will never know. And we — we will control the arms pipeline through Afghanistan. Now, and forever.”

The giants continued to bicker, but Alexei couldn’t hear it. With a popping sensa-tion, he broke through the surface of the medium of this new place —

— and looked on lights. Like a night sky in wilderness, there were so many.

Not stars, though. They were paired — like eyes, staring down on him — across at him — from a wall of black, roiling cloud. Some were bright, some were dim, and occasionally they winked on and off — as though they were blinking.

Behind him — below him — at the surface of the liquid medium from which he’d emerged — giants conferred.

“Comrade Vostovitch. Stop playing sex games with the girl. Assemble the Mujahe-deen. Make the ready the Cistern.”

“They are on their way.”

“And Tokovsky. Bring one more along to watch Shadak. Kilodovich has other work to do.”

“This one?”

“No. Too small. The one by the truck.”

“Where?”

As Alexei watched, a great arm reached out — up — possibly down — from the sur-face of the liquid, and touched upon the wall — ceiling — floor? — where two points flashed on and off. “There,” rumbled the giant.

Curious, Alexei approached those two, climbing/crossing/falling the expanse in a heartbeat.

It was as though he put his eyes to the lenses of binoculars. But rather than see-ing a distant peak through them, he now looked upon the side of a truck. The picture turned sickeningly and was replaced by the darkness of the cave mouth. Men were moving away from him — heading deeper into the cave with boxes and weapons. Then the view shifted again, and approached the fold in the cave wall that Alexei knew led to the chimney room. If he concentrated, he could hear conversation coming through the fold. Then the view was through it, and all was dark for a time.

Alexei pulled back from the lights, and pushed away from the wall, drifting back toward the giants. He felt himself smile as the understanding dawned on him.

This, he realized, was a catalogue of City 512’s sleepers. Two points of light for all of them. He tried to count, but stopped: it seemed there were as many on this wall as there were stars in the sky. He flitted over to another set of eyes — looking down at a sheet of typewritten French — and another, that were sitting on a train, inches from the glass, watching the industrialized outskirts of some city or another drift by in the rising, or possibly setting, sun — and others, in meetings and driving automobiles and masturbating at pornography and actually making love . . .

Alexei laughed, and did a little cosmonaut tumble. He turned around in so doing, to face the giants. His eyes had grown accustomed to the peculiar non-light in here. The giants were floating on the odd surface, all in the same place — overlapping — like a great Shiva, a multi-armed, multipeded god-goddess. Arms would flash out, touch-ing these lights or those lights, or one of them, to reach below the water to pluck at something, or rest folded on the shared stomach.

Where in all that, wondered Alexei, in all that great collective of being, was Fyodor Kolyokov?

Where, he wondered, was Alexei?

“Where is Kilodovich?” said one of the giants as the hand came back above the water.

“There!” And before Alexei could move, one of the great arms shot forward and wrapped around his waist. “Gotten loose! Nearly escaped!”

“I told you this was dangerous, Fyodor.”

“Many tools are dangerous in untrained hands.”

Alexei twisted in the grip of the giant. As he did, he saw the star field had increased: as though the contact with the giant had expanded his vision.